A 51% attack is an attack on a cryptocurrency blockchain where a miner or group of miners controls more than 50% of the mining power or hash.
Controlling that much power grants the influence to make significant adjustments to the network, including altering records thus being able to reverse transactions or even create new coins.
As many have wondered, this is an unlikely scenario for a top cryptocurrency blockchain like bitcoin as it is not cost-efficient to acquire enough mining rigs to gain such a hash rate, what is to be earned is far little to the expense.
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Specifically aimed at marketing a said asset to gain users, traders, and potential investors.
Airdrops are free coins or tokens issued to select cryptocurrency wallet addresses based on a pre-defined qualification measure.
Airdrops are free and usually a way of incentivizing community members at large.
An algorithm is a set of rules, instructions, or programs that are targeted at solving specific problems.
The word “Algorithm” became famous in the cryptocurrency space since the inception of "algorithm stablecoins".
These coins are designed to follow certain mint and burn rules which are aimed at keeping the price stable and pegged to a price value of a defined asset.
As opposed to an ATH, an all-time-low is a reference to the lowest point in an event observation. This is specifically used when making reference to the lowest point of value of a given asset.
Let’s say a company stock was first sold at $1 each, provided that remains the lowest point of value that stock has been, it becomes its all-time-low, same thing applies to cryptocurrency prices.
Every cryptocurrency created after bitcoin is considered an altcoin, or alternative coin.
Even though cryptocurrencies like ether(ETH) were created to complement the idea of Bitcoin's peer-to-peer and decentralized ecosystem, many investors have turned to view each new asset as a replacement for the other.
Altcoins are often categorized, as the name implies “alternative”, in place of investing in bitcoin.
An annual percentage rate(APR) is basically an interest paid or owed, calculated on a yearly basis, measured in a percentage of the initial amount. An APR takes into account the fees or any additional cost associated with the amount.
What this means is that say an individual, loans $100, and the APR to be paid is 12%, if a fee of say 2% is inclusive, that’s settled for a borrower, but if it was the other way around, where a lender is to receive 12% APR with fees of 2% inclusive, that would mean the actual interest is 10%, excluding the charge that may be associated with the account.
That said, Unlike APY, APR isn’t all friendly to borrowers because APR doesn’t take compound interest into account.
Using the same $100 loan with a 12% APR specified. Considering that is calculated based on a yearly contract, 12% isn’t always the actual amount to be paid, how?
Compound interest is absent in the specified rate, for a $100 loan, the theoretical monthly amount to pay is $1 based on an APR of 12%.
Now, provided the loan gets repaid in a month's time, they are no additional charges, but in situations where it spans through a year, each $1 added per month is charged an equal 12%.
So a borrower is paying an additional 12% each passing month on the roll-over interests(which theoretically is $1).
An annual percentage yield is similarly, an interest paid to an initial amount borrowed or invested. However, all things are not equal, an APY takes compound interest into consideration, and so, specified rates are appropriately calculated with underlying compound interests.
However, APY comes with its own flaws, unlike the Annual Percentage Rate(APR), APY doesn't include fees, so every additional charge is not displayed on the contract interest calculator.
Arbitrage is simply a methodology used in trading assets. It primarily includes trading the price difference of a given asset across different markets or sometimes, the same market but different trading pairs.
Using bitcoin as an example, arbitrage trading involving bitcoin would be weighing its prices on different exchanges, if a sizable spread is noticed across exchanges, then an arbitrage can be carried out.
Often acknowledge are the less risky pattern of trading because you’re just buying here, where it’s cheaper to sell there, where it’s costlier. However, it comes with its own weaknesses and people often flee from it as it requires a whole lot of screen time to spot profitable entry zones.
An asset could frankly be anything, depending on who is asked, the answer varies. This is so because what one may term valuable, another may not, so typically, it boils down to the "who" in question.
However, in financial accounting, an asset refers to any resource with perceivable economic value, which can be owned by anyone. An asset can be virtual/digital or physical. A house is most often a top asset reference, a cryptocurrency can also be viewed as an asset.
Asset allocation is an investment strategy that is adopted to manage risks. It basically has to do with the diversification of value across different assets, trying to create a balance while at it.
Asset allocation takes into consideration what's more stable and has a higher productive probability long or short term, most conclusions are attained by weighing each asset to determine where the value should be contained and how much.
An atomic swap is simply a decentralized exchange(DEX) that functions on a peer-to-peer structure.
Atomic swaps utilize smart contracts to facilitate transactions or exchanges of cryptocurrencies of different blockchains.
Unlike centralized exchanges where transactions can not be processed without the involvement of a third party, atomic swaps with their smart contract capabilities and design, do not require any third party to process transactions, making the exchange fully peer-to-peer.
Also, atomic swaps do not rely on centralized liquidities, unlike an Automated Market Maker(AMM).
Avalanche is a cryptocurrency blockchain that is powered by its native token AVAX.
Avalanche uses a proof-of-stake(PoS) consensus mechanism, AVAX is required to participate as a validator.
Popularly referred to as an “Ethereum Killer”, Avalance blockchain is reported to process about 4,500 transactions per second(TPS). With smart contract capabilities, avalanche hosts various decentralized applications(DApps).
The Ethereum rival has a max token supply of 720 million with validators given the power to influence how rapidly these tokens are minted.
A bagholder is simply an individual that is left holding a balance of investment currently worth nothing.
Bagholders are believed to be FOMO buyers who get into a project at the peak of all the excitement or as rapid marketing fills the air, and end up holding the bag of investments as it dumps in price until nothingness.
A balance sheet is typically a company's financial report showing all balances often including cash, investment assets, and more.
Balance sheets are investors' key references or determinants of a project, company, or business's health moving forward. Often used to weigh if a business is stable, productive, or running at a loss.
As the name implies, bank reserves are basically set aside cash amounts that are imposed on commercial banks as a requirement for scenarios of large withdrawal requests.
Banks are known for loaning out deposits, this is primarily how they can profit from their services, as such, a situation where bank loans out most of its cash deposits can be disastrous, and so, to avoid catastrophic events, these requirements are imposed on commercial banks by the central banks.
These reserves are often held in physical cash in a bank vault at specified locations or held in an account run by the central bank.
A banknote is basically the money we utilize each day, also known as a bill or simply a note.
A banknote constitutes a value printed on a physical paper bill. Banknotes are issued only by the central bank and are backed by good faith, as opposed to the era when these currencies were backed by precious metals.
Bankruptcy is a legal proceeding in which a debtor, as an individual or business, is relieved of outstanding obligations or debts that cannot be paid.
Struggling companies or businesses often file for bankruptcy to help scale forward past their bad debts.
Often referred to as a fresh start that grants debtors and creditors access to fresh credits to rebuild, as a debtor, it is often difficult to get back into the field of business as these proceeds remain a stigma for years.
A bear market typically refers to a period of time when the financial markets suffer losses of 20% or more. Most references the bleeding of the prices of securities as an indicator, but many other factors play in.
Bear markets span a period of months that vary based on different factors, historically, cryptocurrency bear markets have a more prolonged nature.
Analysts often refer to a false trend movement that signals a downtrend reversal as a bear trap. In simpler terms, bear traps are trading patterns that are formed to trick undiligent investors to think a bleeding market has a reversal.
Believed to be created or influenced by institutional traders trying to trap retail investors and make money off their unsuspecting decisions to create long positions.
Bitcoin is a digital asset and blockchain built to function outside the control of centralized agencies. Bitcoin facilitates transactions in a peer-to-peer manner without the involvement of a third party.
With the help of its distributed ledger technology, transactions are immutably and publicly hosted, aiding with transparency and security of the network.
Though many may have the idea of automatic teller machines that dispense cash, a bitcoin atm is nothing like that, clearing, as bitcoin is a digital asset.
What a bitcoin atm does is connect to the internet and bitcoin network, enabling individuals to purchase bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies with cash.
A bitcoin improvement proposal or simply BIP is a proposed development document that is created by anyone with the intent to improve bitcoin. BIPs usually require consensus by miners to get passed into functionality.
Bitcoin is an open-source and decentralized network, which gives it certain advantages, one of many is the ability for anyone to work on developing any part of it.
The nature of bitcoin makes it community-governed, bitcoin improvement proposal is one-way community members from developers to supporters can come together to build and help bitcoin and its network scale.
Bitcoin mining is a process by which miners expand the supply of bitcoin by creating new blocks and verifying transactions.
This process helps secure the network as transactions grouped and chained to the blockchain are validated by a vast number of miners.
Bitcoin uses a proof-of-work(PoW) consensus algorithm where miners have to work by solving a mathematical puzzle to create blocks, verify transactions and earn block rewards.
As any setup or project may have it, an information document, proposal, or maybe a blog post is often the go-to in order to get an idea of something to the general public, this is exactly what the bitcoin whitepaper is.
Published in 2008 by Satoshi Nakamoto, the famous bitcoin whitepaper and its ideas therein have earned mass attention and respective adoption.
A block is probably a word that gets thrown around the cryptocurrency space often, it simply represents data recorded on the blockchain. But considering that there are a lot of different kinds of data, what are blocks really?
The blockchain as we would love to illustrate has two sides with a connection, the “blocks” and the “chain”. Chains are immutable and supposedly unique data structures, however, blocks are not, until verified by miners through a consensus of record authenticity
A block is basically a group of data, transactions in this context, that are arranged together in a space of a specified size depending on the network.
Miners group data(transactions) into blocks before posting it to the distributed ledger.
A blockchain is a distributed ledger, an immutable data structure. Data stored on the blockchain are replicated or shared across numerous computers.
Although blockchain is of different types including privately operating blockchains, the word “blockchain” is most recognized in the field of public networks where operations and data are publicly hosted.
With the aid of shared ledgers, the blockchain attains immutability as the network records are more safely hosted.
A block explorer is simply a system or tool that can be used to sort various data from the blockchain.
A block explorer typically helps individuals access information passed through the blockchain, this includes transactions with their associated metadata.
A block explorer aids in the transparency of the blockchain, data are presented in blocks, with respect to block heights, but also, specific pieces of information can be attained by utilizing the appropriate query hash.
A block height makes reference to previously added blocks in a distributed ledger.
The blockchain is a data structure where transactions are grouped into blocks and posted to the network.
A block height, in theory, represents the length of previously chain blocks of data on the network.
A block producer is a term that’s most often used in blockchains using delegated proof-of-stake(DPoS) mechanisms to attain a consensus.
Block producers are similar to miners on the bitcoin proof-of-work (PoW) network algorithm, but unlike miners, block producers are called “delegates or witnesses” and are assigned their position on the chain based on a voting system, where coin holders elect them to secure the network by producing blocks and verify transactions.
A block reward is an incentive, paid to block producers, validators, or miners for securing the blockchain by creating blocks and verifying transactions.
On the Bitcoin network, a miner that verifies a block earns a specified amount of bitcoin, predefined to halve every four years or 210,000 blocks, bitcoin block reward is currently 6.25 BTC per block.
Block time simply is the time it takes a miner, validator, or witness to verify a block of transactions.
A block time varies across networks, bitcoin block time is an estimated 10 minutes while other networks are even less. Block time influences how fast transactions are processed and often impacts the scalability of a network.
This is a term thrown around the cryptocurrency space when most of its asset prices decrease.
In theory, it’s a replacement phrase describing a bear market atmosphere. Bloodbaths are influenced by many things including governments' shifts in monetary policies which oftentimes affect major financial markets.
A bounty is typically a reward paid for the completion of a given task. The value of these bounties varies based on the task and network, or in cases of bounties given to retrieve stolen funds, bounties can be a handful of money.
Employed as a means of rewarding individuals that contribute to the development of a network, a bounty can be paid to developers or community members that spot and report various network flaws, and so, are rewarded according to the magnitude of the flaw.
With the vulnerability of most crypto projects where network funds are exploited, a bounty is often offered to the bad actors, as an appeal to retrieve part of the stolen funds.
A cryptocurrency bubble refers to the speculation that the prices of said assets are way off their real value.
Economists and most times, no-coiners call the entire cryptocurrency market a bubble, insinuating that prices will drop rapidly when the bubble bursts.
Similarly, NFTs have been often described as a bubble, with declarations that they have no value and are just jpegs in theory.
As opposed to bear markets, bull markets are referenced as a period in time when the financial asset markets, like cryptocurrencies, see significant price upward movements.
A bull market showcases positive price trends across all asset pairs, often unpredictable when it comes to how long a time it takes to phase out, however, various claims are adopted as technical analysis that predicts price trends, thus market circles.
The cryptocurrency space is a fan of scarcity and so, embraces all acts that promote it.
Bitcoin is a major example of scarcity-effective cryptocurrency and economy, so most crypto projects tend to develop their structures in ways that promote a similar idea.
Burning is part of this idea, burning in this context refers to the taking away of a certain amount of tokens or coins, usually sent to an inaccessible address.
Particularly, burning cryptocurrencies is aimed at increasing their value as fewer tokens or coins are available in the markets afterward.
That said, this theory fairly works for a short time as the rules of scarcity are only effective when they are utilities built around the said assets.
Money in its original form can be viewed as capital, considering that it holds value and can be immediately utilized.
These are the attributes of capital, liquid and valuable, put together, capital is simply liquid cash that can be utilized for production or investment.
Typically, everything begins with capital, the process of its acquisition is nearly not important, and an investment cannot be in place without the capital to engage in that contract.
In the crypto space, it’s no different as these virtual currencies require capital to acquire.
Capital gain is a direct reference to a profit made in the course of an investment, it is viewed as the realized added value difference gained at the closure of an investment or put simply when an investment contract is closed or an asset is sold.
On the contrary, a capital loss is as opposed to a capital gain, meaning that we are looking at the losses incurred at the closure of an investment contract or when an asset previously bought is sold.
A capital loss is observed when the realized balance is lower than the initial investment capital, as opposed to the realized increase which entrails a capital gain.
If you wanted to say stock market or bond markets without listing the two out, then the way to say it would be “capital market”.
Simply, a capital market brings lenders and borrowers together, where lenders loan or invest their money in exchange for securities such as stocks or bonds.
There are two types of capital markets, primary and secondary markets.
Primary markets are the “New issues markets”. Assets sold could be likened to pre-sales observed in the crypto space, where a limited number of investors get their hands on digital assets, mostly at a much-discounted rate.
In contrast, secondary markets are publicly traded and regulated markets like Nasdaq.
Capitulation is quite a word that can get thrown around a lot, especially amongst stock market investors, with questions like “has the stock market capitulated?” getting spread a lot, now what does this really mean?
simply,
“Sold at loss”
A declining market that suddenly incurs more losses by mass selling from investors is often noted as a capitulating market.
The process usually has many investors selling at a low in fear of losing more. Often when the question aforementioned is thrown in, investors are usually looking out to buy the dip, however, only high-risk tolerant investors happen to take this up.
In business, the term “cash flow” is used as a reference to the amount of money passing through a channel.
Cryptocurrency cash flow basically refers to the amount of value or money transferred in and out of a protocol or network.
Billions of dollars are transferred through this channel on different occasions, and so cryptocurrency projects have been noted to attract a great amount of public interest.
A Central bank, as the name implies, is a central authority in the finance and banking system.
Also known as the reserve bank, the central bank is a monetary authority with the privileged rights to oversee and control the production of money and likewise, its distribution to states, and nations of the world.
What is a CBDC? As a borrowed concept spawn from the rapid growth of cryptocurrencies, a CBDC is basically central bank money, created, issued, and controlled by them.
It was created with the agenda to replace cryptocurrencies as a couple of nations of the world find them risky based on their volatility and lack of regulation.
As opposed to the structure of decentralized or distributed ledgers, central ledgers which are also called general ledgers are basically databases, which could be physical or digital where data such as transaction records are stored.
These ledgers are privately managed, thus the name “central”, implying the management structure.
Centralization is often discussed in the financial sector as the process whereas a governing body of policies and decision-making is delegated to a small group or controlled by one person.
Many organizations are centralized based on their default structure of having a founder/CEO, managing director, or board of directors who basically decides on what or how things get done.
Although not many are aware of the issuing companies of most centralized stablecoins, Circle is actually the issuer of USDC, which is vastly used in the cryptocurrency space, as majorly a Hegde to the volatility of assets across blockchain protocols.
That said, Circle is a peer-to-peer payment technology company founded in 2013. Circle pay is a mobile payment platform through which the technology company enables its users to hold, send and receive fiat currencies.
Cipher is a term used in cryptography to reference an algorithm that deals with the encryption of messages, these messages are called ciphertext in their encoded forms.
We can see how these relate to blocks and their hashes, where bitcoin uses the SHA-256 hash function to generate these strings.
That said, unlike hashes which are a one-way function, Ciphertexts can be decrypted using crypto-variables or keys.
These keys are authorized sets of numbers, letters, or both, most commonly called a string, that when processed through an algorithm, can decode the ciphertext.
A cryptocurrency circulating supply refers to the number of tokens or coins that are available in the open.
Usually, cryptocurrencies come with pre-defined supply structures, whereas over a period of time, the ecosystem matures through them.
The circulating supply is usually calculated by deriving the number of tokens or coins of a given project, present in various cryptocurrency addresses.
One of the easiest ways to determine the circulating supply of a coin is by assessing the mined volume, particularly with bitcoin, the only way new coins come into existence is through mining, and this process expands the supply, increasing the circulating number of coins.
What is a cloud? In the digital space, a cloud is basically a database, network, server, or storage software.
That said, cloud computing refers to the delivery of these tools and applications.
Storing things in a cloud is currently a modernized way of safe-keeping information, usually as a backup file structure where one doesn't have to physically hold or have hand-reach access to the storage but rather, pay for a remote available storage.
As a reference or example of cloud computing, cloud mining is a service that serves the purpose of a predefined structure.
Cloud mining is a term used in the crypto space to define the process of expanding the supply of said crypto assets through mining by third-party services.
So unlike regular mining operations, where with bitcoin, one has to privately run and maintain heavy hardware, cloud mining is more like a service where people pay to acquire mining contracts to engage in this activity when in reality, have no physical mining rigs or units.
Coins in the cryptocurrency space usually refer to fungible crypto assets with their own blockchain, that is, being the native asset of the base structure.
Also known as the Layer 1 assets or currencies, an example of coins are Bitcoin, operating on the Bitcoin blockchain, Ether on Ethereum, and Hive on the Hive Blockchain.
Coins are often confused with tokens but they are very different from each other.
The function of a coin mixer is to create some sort of anonymity for a cryptocurrency transaction.
Coin mixing services serve as a third party, playing a middleman between two transacting individuals looking to make their transactions blend in and become untraceable, aiding its final destination to be unknown.
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Collateral is contract protection, usually a valuable asset that is placed as a pledge by the borrower to a lender in a financial contract.
Collaterals are put in place to ensure the repayments of loans, however, though not limited to a physical asset, anything deemed valuable by the transacting individuals can be used as collateral.
A contract can be over-collateralized in the sense that a borrower's pledge is more valuable than the borrowing amount. This is often the preferred path to take as it only ensures that repayment is done to avoid the expense of losing the collateral.
A commodity is simply a fungible resource with economic value, that can be used as an input for the production of other goods.
Commodities are usually raw materials, processed raw materials are called products.
A compound Interest takes into account the principal amount plus the accumulated amount of an investment contract.
What that means is, unlike simple interest as we saw in the basics of APR and APY, compound interest adds up the compounding amount of a contract.
In a literal sense, consider a contract where an investment pays 12% interest each year, where 1% is the monthly paid amount, compound interest adds up that 1% to the initial amount, paying interest for the next month for both the initial investment plus the previously added interest amount.
A consensus is basically an agreement amongst or between individuals.
In the cryptocurrency space, various consensus algorithms are adopted to ensure the security of projects and their blockchain.
Bitcoin uses a proof-of-work(PoW) consensus mechanism whereas Ethereum uses Proof-of-stake(POS), other notable examples are delegated-proof-of-stake(DPOS) and proof-of-history (POH).
Although people often mix up the definitions as to what is Cosmos and what is Cosmos Hub(Atom).
Maybe you've never realized, there's a difference but they are linked together.
Cosmos Hub is a blockchain that is said to be an economic center of the Cosmos network.
Cosmos Hub provides a number of services to blockchains connected to it. On its list of services are: the largest interchain token exchange, shared security through interchain security, bridges to Ethereum (ETH) and Bitcoin (BTC), and secure custodianship of digital assets. Atom is the native coin of the network.
Cosmos, on the other hand, is often called the internet of blockchains. Cosmos brings the Interoperability of blockchains to life with great underlying technologies such as the Tendermint with the byzantine fault tolerant (BFT) algorithm, a socket protocol called ABCI, the Cosmos SDK, and the Inter-Blockchain Communication protocol(IBC).
What is cryptocurrency? To understand most of the matters of this ecosystem, one must first learn about what powers it, or what fuels its economy.
A cryptocurrency is simply a digital or virtual asset, operated and managed via a distributed ledger technology, the blockchain.
What makes all the applications built in this ecosystem relevant is a cryptocurrency, the reason being that each and every structure is built to foster the economy of the native assets of the network, a cryptocurrency.
So the value of all its applications is contained in its virtual asset which varies from coins to tokens of different blockchains with different ledger and database designs, projects like layer 2 solutions, or simply community networks.
A faucet as we know is more like a regulator of liquid, channeled through a pipe. Typically, a faucet lets out the liquid.
Knowing this, the phrase "Cryptocurrency faucet" is coined from the idea of a system that lets out cryptocurrencies.
That said, a cryptocurrency faucet is basically a platform that pays users in crypto for completing various simple tasks.
The rewards are proportional to the task but are often more passive than a fat income stream.
A typical wallet is where we keep money, a cryptocurrency wallet is where we store cryptocurrencies.
A cryptocurrency wallet can be hardware or software, based on individual preference, a cryptocurrency wallet is simply a compartment for storing cryptocurrencies.
A cryptocurrency wallet serves as a storehouse, but a wallet address is the actual beholder of the currencies.
A wallet may consist of different cryptocurrencies depending on wallet compatibility, each having a select address.
This address is also known as a public key, it enables the blockchain to read the data contained in it and validate transactions in and out of it with also the help of a private key.
Cryptography embodies the entire conceptual values of cryptocurrency and blockchain technology. As one can easily spot the name similarities, cryptocurrency could be viewed as a byproduct of cryptography.
Now, what is cryptography? Cryptography simply refers to information and communication techniques applied to create secure transmission of data.
Cryptography is based upon several algorithms, these sets of rules determine how data is passed from location A to location B.
Cryptography basically encrypts information or encodes it to a language not merely decipherable, but by the use of secret keys, the information can be decrypted.
A Crypto Winter is basically a bear market atmosphere in the cryptocurrency space.
Cryptocurrencies are considered to be in a winter season when prices of most assets are riding lows prior to all-time-highs(ATH) or previous rallies.
A currency is defined as an acceptable means of trade, usually paper bills or physical coins.
However, since technology is rapidly changing or reshaping things, the number of currencies is growing in the digital world, most commonly termed digital assets.
An example is cryptocurrencies where stablecoins are most often referenced as a befitting asset.
Many organizations or sectors may choose to have their own currency following select principles, with this, several algorithms are designed to handle its growth, utility, and scalability.
A custodian is basically a financial institution set up to receive and hold customers' assets for safekeeping.
According to Investopedia, a custodian also provides accounting and settlement services such as managing dividends or interests distributed to the account.[s]
Data is basically a set of information ranging from a descriptive, informative, structural or technical format.
With the wide usage of the internet, we transmit a great range of data daily, and this transmitted information could be grouped or stored in what is called a database.
A database is simply a structure holding grouped data for a wide range of purposes. Databases are structured differently depending on what data is being collected and stored, so, the ordering of data in a database follows strict grouping procedures, based on the data format.
Organizations all have databases where information is stored for future purposes.
Most data are stored for report purposes. Looking at it from a business standpoint, a company's database holds information about sales, determining profit or potential losses.
Also, a database grouping the employees' information is one of many more databases a business would operate. This information could also be collected and stored for a statistics report.
DDoS is an abbreviation for "Distributed Denial-of-service", hence, a DDoS attack is an attempt to disrupt the distribution of content or services to a target audience.
An attacker typically spams a network, service, or server, like a website with fake traffic, making it difficult for organic or real traffic to access the content of the site.
Attackers utilize the resources of multiple computers to launch this attack, this is only possible if an attacker can remotely control many computers to send requests to the targeted server or network, as such, malware-infected computers which an attacker controls, are what is being utilized via remote commands.
A Dead cat bounce is an interesting concept applied in technical analysis. The term "Dead Cat Bounce" originated from Wall Street, proposing an assertion that even a dead cat can bounce if it falls from a great height.
What does it mean exactly? A dead cat bounce in the financial system is simply a price trend that proposes a relief pattern after a great price decline. Analysts consider this trend a "Suckers' rally" as prices are expected to resume declining patterns.
In simple terms, debt is money an individual or company owes to another. Good debts may pose some benefits, usually, individuals or companies borrow this money to make purchases which in some cases include investments or business setup, and sometimes to fund non-profit organizations.
The government issues debt securities like bonds to do the same thing. Debt can practically be anything ranging from a favor, pledge or even a service owed, however, the most common debt has to do with money.
Decentralization is the opposite of centralization. Decentralization delegates power and influence placed on planning and decision-making to a vast majority of people.
In the cryptocurrency space, the decentralization of blockchains is a primary concept proposed to enhance the development process of the ecosystem.
A decentralized application(DApps) is typically a program that operates autonomously, without the need for a central authority. A decentralized application processes transactions in a peer-to-peer structure, aiding in more network flexibility scalability, and financial security.
Decentralized applications function via smart contracts primarily proposed and developed on the Ethereum network. These smart contracts control the autonomous operations in the system, thereby avoiding the flaws of human involvement.
A decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) emerged as an alternative governance structure to the traditional system of governance, the centralized structure, usually putting a single individual at the top with the influence to alter operations in a system.
A DAO is typically a group of individuals with a shared or common goal to work in favor of the interest of its ecosystem. DAOs are vastly implemented in the cryptocurrency space to aid in the governance of network funds(Treasury) and their utilization process.
Typically, a DAO is influenced and operated based on currency or asset holdings, meaning that individuals need to have a said amount of network coins or protocol tokens to be a DAO member.
One's decision influence is directly proportional to the amount of currency held or shares owned.
A decentralized exchange(DEX) is a marketplace built to displace the centralized needs of transacting.
A decentralized exchange facilitates transactions in a peer-to-peer manner, by the use of smart contracts to handle transaction finality thereby removing the need for third-party involvement.
Users can process instant swaps or trades of cryptocurrencies on a decentralized exchange provided the liquidity for the pair is available.
Decentralized Finance(DeFi) is a term used to describe financial technologies and their products and services based on a distributed ledger technology(DLT).
Typically, three things are majorly involved in a DeFi structure, the first is the blockchain - what network it runs on.
The second is the smart contracts, which typically determine the nature of its financial products, how operations are handled and how finances are managed. And lastly, a decentralized exchange, aiding for in-app conversion of value.
Three of these make a DeFi platform, the goal of DeFi is to eliminate the control banks or centralized entities have on one's finances and operations therein.
Traditionally, governance has always been a central thing, the structures built around planning and decision-making have been highly placed in the hands of a circle of individuals or sometimes a single individual.
Decentralized governance aims to eradicate the dangerous effects central control has on governance.
In the cryptocurrency space, many operations are handled in a decentralized manner, ranging from distributed ledgers to DAOs, the building of DEXs, and DeFi platforms powered by smart contracts, all designed to eliminate central control.
Deflation simply refers to the general depreciation of prices of goods and services, this is often caused by the contraction of the money supply.
Deflation causes the purchasing power of money to increase, the reason for this may be diverse, but the reduction of the money supply is often a mechanism for such events.
As opposed to inflation, prices of goods and services decline while currency value increases,
Delegated Proof-of-Stake (DPoS) is a consensus mechanism utilized by cryptocurrency blockchains to attain network security.
DPoS follows the democratic nature of network governance, whereas the node operators, often referred to as "witnesses" are delegated on-chain powers to participate in the validation of blocks and securing of the network.
Basically, stakeholders vote for "representatives" called "witnesses" to secure the network. This consensus algorithm is considered a much more efficient system of governance compared to proof-of-work(PoW) and proof-of-stake(PoS).
Demographics in a data structure is a population presented based on age, race, and sex.
Demographics are metrics often used to determine a project or network participants or users. These data are collected and grouped into the category of race, age, and sex.
The study is applied in many fields, in business, it is used to understand one's audience so as to tailor products and services that best serve its demographics.
The word "deposit" entails two things, the value, and the process. Theoretically, the value refers to the product of the process carried out by an individual.
Not to confuse you, a deposit refers to a value put in, while also defining the process by which the value travels.
Consider this definition of a deposit as the value:
A deposit refers to the sum given to a custodian for either safekeeping or as an investment contract.
Now consider this definition of a deposit as the process:
To deposit means to place value with another, usually financial value with banks or other financial institutions, for the purpose of safekeeping or as an investment contract.
A depth chart is a market instrument or tool, used primarily to understand the size of a market's open book. A depth chart can also be used as an indicator or market watching too for arbitrage.
What is it exactly? A depth chart is basically a data wall, split in two, consisting of the buy wall and the sell wall.
Considering its obvious nature, it is a chart and represents specified data. A depth chart typically shows the orders in a market open book, meaning that data displayed there basically represents all orders present in the market.
Traders can use this to determine how much can be bought or sold at a given price. Depth charts can also be used to spot arbitrage opportunities as it displays overlapping values which aid in discovering price difference across markets and pairs.
A derivative can be treated as an inseparable clone of a given asset or group of assets. This means that they are tied to it.
Simply, a derivative is a financial contract that is backed or tied to an underlying asset. A derivative derives its value from the base asset, that said, a derivative can be used as a hedge against the base asset and so, it's a financial tool most arbitrage traders love.
A developer is simply an individual that works on building a system or refining it.
Cryptocurrency developers have variations in work focus, ranging from blockchain development, token contract development, and even website development, considering that every backend development relies on a frontend for users to access its functions.
A digital asset is simply anything stored on an electronic platform with some sort of value or value-generating mechanism.
Generally, what is perceived as an “asset” has quite a variable, meaning there are a variety of factors to consider.
A cryptocurrency is seen as a digital asset as it possesses an amount of value-generating features, that said, via tokenization, sensitive data can be converted into fungible assets like coins and tokens but also non-fungible pieces of assets called NFTs tied to the blockchain.
Digital gold is a term commonly used to describe bitcoin in the cryptocurrency space.
Considering the attributes of bitcoin, much frankly its mining process, people coined the name as a way of pinning the currency as a digital asset playing the role of gold on the blockchain.
A digital signature is basically a set of keys used to authenticate or validate information passed through a digital platform. The blockchain uses public keys and private keys to perform this work.
Basically, these secret keys are signatures the blockchain can read and validate their value. Every transaction performed on a distributed ledger references several keys for the authentication of information.
Unlike blockchains that rely on miners or validators and their consensus mechanisms, structures like proof-of-wor(PoW) and proof-of-stake(PoS) are not present in a directed acyclic graph.
A DAG-integrated network has no blocks and so transactions are structured like a tree with branches, giving references to previous ones.
A directed acyclic graph is targeted at solving the issues of energy-intensive and resource-wasteful blockchains, with addition to this, a DAG aims to provide more room for scaling a network.
Disinflation is simply the perceived rate of change in the inflation rate.
This refers to the slow impact period of inflation, not to mistake it for "deflation" the federal reserve(Fed) often uses this to determine economic trends.
A distributed ledger is a database with shared data structuring. Typically, data is being replicated or shared through numerous locations, this by theory is intended to make data records secure.
The blockchain is a notable example of a distributed ledger, thus, DLT or distributed ledger technology aids in the decentralization of records, and several algorithms are followed to attain network immutability.
A dividend is simply a reward paid to individuals involved in a specified investment contract. Typically shareholders agreed on earnings per share, a dividend can be cash or other investment assets like stocks, based on the contract agreement.
DOGE or Dogecoin is a cryptocurrency that made its appearance in the space of virtual assets living on the blockchain on December 6, 2013.
DOGE was created as a joke and so it is popularly considered a "meme coin" and notably, the first dog coin.
Elon Musk supports dogecoin with the assertion that it's a better payment system in comparison to Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.
Dollar-cost averaging is an investment approach or strategy applied to curb the effects of potential losses in investment practices.
Dollar-cost averaging involves splitting a total sum of money into smaller amounts and investing over a period of time as opposed to putting all sums in at a time.
Investors and traders believe it's a sustainable pattern of investing considering that it reduces the risk of a greater loss but notwithstanding, dollar cost averaging may lead to the loss of a greater percentage gain if the markets rally against one's scheduled investment plans.
The Dotcom Bubble is a reference to a time at which the financial markets made the craziest rallies of which the aftermath was a crash of over 70%, leading the entire industry to slide into a bear season.
Particularly, in the late 1990s, the U.S. technology stock equity saw a massive dumb of cash that skyrocketed the volumes of tech-dominated indexes like Nasdaq in the years from 1995 to 2000.
2001 through 2002 saw the break of the internet with all the heavily invested internet startups which were speculated to hold the potential of turning a profit.
A massive dump that even blue-chip companies couldn't handle.
Many people have likened or made reference to the Dotcom Bubble when talking about cryptocurrencies, specifically, some believe that it's most likely the same reoccurrence with the growing pace of digital assets.
A double bottom is considered a bullish signal in technical analysis.
Typically, in cryptocurrency trading, analysts or traders refer to a double bottom as a sign that the bears are losing influence in the market.
Double spending is a weakness all blockchain protocols fight against, typically, if a certain influence is attained on the network, a case of double spending may be observed.
In relation to the Bitcoin network, in a situation where a miner controls more than 50% of the mining hash or hash rates, double spending can be observed as the 51% attack vector becomes inevitable.
Dust in the crypto space typically refers to leftovers or unspent units of cryptocurrencies following a transaction, trade, or transfer.
Thus, a dust transaction is the transfer of low-valued units of cryptocurrencies, although crypto dust is harmless at its state, attackers use this to try and break the privacy of wallet addresses.